The following correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and clarifications column, Saturday 27 March 2010

Some inaccurate advice was given in this Dear Jeremy column in answer to questions about redundancy pay and termination of a job contract. Correct advice is supplied in this week's column

I lost my new job when my wife gave birth early. Is that fair?

I was made redundant at the end of December, but found another job, which I started on 1 February. I immediately let my new employers know that my partner and I were expecting a baby in early April, and they agreed to let me have two weeks of my holiday entitlement in lieu of paternity leave. The job was in the middle of nowhere, so I spent £7,000 on a car for my commute.

In the event, my partner had the baby six weeks early, on 21 February. The following day I called my new employers to ask for some time at home: the baby would be in hospital for several weeks and as my partner had a caesarean section, she was unable to drive or look after our eldest daughter properly, so I needed to be around until the baby came out of hospital. Then I asked to take the two weeks' leave as we'd agreed. They suggested I do some work from home in the meantime, to which I agreed.

Over the following week they became less and less keen on me working from home: they found there were technical barriers, and they didn't know what work to give me. Then I got a call to say they'd decided to terminate my contract, to avoid paying the recruitment agency which had signed me its full fee. I pointed out I'd likely be back at work full-time within four weeks but they weren't interested, saying they needed someone right away. I pointed out the contract I'd signed entitled me to a month's notice and they said that the period could cover my unpaid leave at home.

I called Citizens Advice and its staff seemed to think that although the treatment I'd received was brutal and unfair, I had no legal rights because I'd not been working there long enough, and that they were entitled to serve notice on me over four weeks' unpaid leave. Even so, I find it hard to believe there's nothing at all I can call on in this situation.

If Citizens Advice tells you that you've no legal rights to help you … well, I imagine its people know what they're talking about. And I'd agree with their opinion that the treatment you've received has been brutal, a point to which I'll return.

But first let me risk your wrath – and probably that of many other readers – by inviting you to do your best to look at this sad story through the eyes of your new employers. I may well be over-generous in the suppositions I make, but here goes.

The company is stretched and its existing staff overworked. Because the company is "in the middle of nowhere" it's not easy to immediately get extra, qualified staff, so they were delighted that you bought yourself a car and joined on 1 February.

They may not have been quite so pleased when the first thing you asked for was two weeks of your holiday entitlement to be taken in lieu of paternity leave, but your request was reasonable and they could look forward to you having a couple of months of settling in before the baby was born.

In the event, you were able to work for just three weeks and you had absolutely no choice but to ask for leave to look after your daughter. Your company agreed but, presumably still overstretched, suggested you work from home, which you willingly attempted to do. For whatever reason (technical problems, they suggest), this didn't seem to work out well.

They were then faced with the prospect of you being away for a further four weeks, with pressure of work affecting the rest of their staff. At this point it's possible they remembered another suitable applicant they'd seen before they took you on, and who was immediately available. It was then that they took the decision, which they were legally entitled to do, to terminate your contract.

Now, I've painted the actions and motives of your company here in the best possible light, maybe more charitably than merited. Their behaviour remains, at the very best, deeply insensitive and I can understand your anger and frustration. But by inviting you to think things through from your company's point of view, I hope you'll find it possible to divert your energy from what could well be an embittering search for compensation to a more positive search for your next opportunity, and one which I very much hope serves you and your partner a great deal better than the last one.

PR firm wants me to go freelance, but will I get my redundancy pay?

I am a PR consultant and have been working for the same PR agency for seven years. I was recently told that because of my client portfolio not being profitable enough, my employer was considering reducing my hours to a part-time job, or employing me on a freelance basis. It has given me a month to bring in new business before implementing any changes. I have been considering going freelance for a while, because I believe it would help me achieve a better work-life balance (I have a young family), so this is definitely the route I would choose. My question is whether the agency would need to make me redundant, and therefore give me the redundancy package I'm entitled to, before I can go freelance.

I'm pretty sure redundancy packages can be challenged by HMRC if the company that makes you redundant then immediately provides you with a significant amount of paid freelance work – but I'm no expert, so check this out with the Acas advisory service. And bear this in mind if you're tempted to take up your employer's challenge to bring in new business. If successful, you might choose to stay full-time; but if you still hankered after the freelance life, you might easily discover you'd be unable to work on the very business you'd been instrumental in acquiring. Proceed with great care and be sure to get authoritative legal counsel.

For Jeremy Bullmore's advice on a work issue, send a brief email to dear.jeremy@guardian.co.uk. Please note that he is unable to answer questions of a legal nature or reply personally

Readers' response

• Re: the man who cares too much about marketing (Dear Jeremy, 13 March). I thought the advice you gave was spot-on. I used to work in mainstream marketing but got fed up with the politics and bullying in many agencies. I have been working as a freelance marketing strategist for eight years. My work is diverse and rewarding. I aim to empower my clients to get them to see that they can achieve better communications with a little push from me in the right direction.

Your correspondent seems to feel his passion for writing is missing in his new vocation. The only extra advice I can offer is for him to write a blog. This should satisfy his need to write and he could offer good old-fashioned advice about marketing. If he is feeling stronger, what about that novel? He needs to build up his confidence and stop lusting after an ideal that does not exist. After all as you say, communication skills are needed in every job, not just marketing.

This man's experience is a sad although, I suspect, common experience of the marketing industry. Lucy Middleton

• Re: the English graduate struggling to find a job in the publishing/arts and culture sector (Dear Jeremy, 13 March). The letter itself demonstrates one of the biggest reasons why the writer is not being called for interview or offered a position – unpaid internships. Why would any employer pay somebody to do something which people are queuing up to do for nothing? Paid work in popular industries such as this is going to become more and more difficult to get while employers are allowed to exploit young graduates, and those who are prepared to work for nothing must accept that this is an inevitable consequence of what they are doing. Catherine Long